Spring Eikaiwa Forum

Attention all Eikaiwa Teachers!  Come and join the Spring edition of the Eikaiwa Forum. As usual, everything will be online and free. Teachers and professionals from the Eikaiwa industry can share their experiences, discuss teaching techniques, network with other educators, and broaden thier horizons.

This Spring's speakers are: 

Darcey Barge will be giving a presentation on Understanding Burnout as Experienced by Eikaiwa Teachers

Darcey obtained an MA from the Graduate School of Intercultural Communication, Rikkyo University, Japan.  Her research interests include the emotional identity of language teachers. Her MA research examined burnout among English teachers in the private sector in Japan. She will be working at Rikkyo University and Tokyo Kasei University from April 2024

Trevor Sitler will be giving a presentation on A Qualitative Study of Corrective Feedback in Small Classrooms. 

Trevor recently graduated from the University of Birmingham with an MA in TESOL. His research interests include corpus linguistics, register analysis, and TBLT. Having worked at an Eikaiwa for nine years, from April he will start working at Kindai University, Ryukoku University, and Kobe International University. 

March 30 - SIETAR Kansai presents: Women's Mini Film Festival, co-sponsored with Osaka & Nara JALT

March is Women’s History Month, so in celebration:

Women Filmmakers: Past, Present, and Future
Sat, March 30, 2:00 - 5:00 pm

Language: English
Venue: Nishinomiya Daigaku Koryu Center (ACTA East Tower 6F Room 1)
2 minutes from Hankyu Nishinomiya Kitaguchi station
Social event (optional): Dinner after the session at a nearby restaurant
Reservations are required by March 27 (Wed). Contact: fujimotodonna@gmail.com

The Film Festival presenters:

PAST: Tamarah Cohen taught English at the university level and made several thought-provoking films as well as transforming hundreds of student presentations into interactional video-based teaching material. She retired early to devote herself 100% to her cat sanctuary in Kyoto. (Tamarah won't be present for the event, but Donna Fujimoto will show some of Tamarah's former students' videos.)

PRESENT: Felicity Tillack is an Australian writer and filmmaker who has made several feature and short films based in Japan. She has an active YouTube channel, Instagram, and TikTok series–all of which explore Japan and its culture. Her debut 2019 film “Impossible to Imagine,” a romantic film dealing with identity and bicultural issues, is streaming on Amazon Prime. Those without Prime can watch the film on Vimeo (rent or buy). Please watch this before the event due to time constraints. 

FUTURE: Seunghyun Lee, is a designer and videographer from Seoul who has recently made a short feminist-leaning video based on a Korean legend. She is currently working on using video to bring to life the oil painting and personal records of Jang-Mi, an up-and-coming artist, who is painfully aware of Korean society’s anti-women currents. This collaboration is new and innovative, and it promises to open interesting perspectives in the world of art and film.

Winter Eikaiwa Forum

Attention all Eikaiwa Teachers! Come join the winter edition of the Eikaiwa Forum. As usual, everything will be online and free. Teachers and professionals from the Eikaiwa industry can share their experiences, discuss teaching techniques, network with other educators, and overall just broaden thier horizons. 

This winter's speakers are: 

Camilo Villanueva. He will be giving a presentation on: Creative Writing and Literature in the Language Learning Classroom. 

Biography: Camilo Villanueva is an EFL Lecturer at Nagoya University of Foreign Studies. He is also a doctoral student in English literature and pedagogy at Murray State University. He researches using creative writing and literature in the EFL classroom. He has an MFA in Fiction Writing from Concordia University, St. Paul, and a BA in Anthropology from Emory University. 

Samia Haseeb Khan. She will be giving a presentation on: Fun and Interactive Games

Biography: Samia Haseeb Khan was raised in Oman and India. She has been instructing learners of all ages and skill levels for over fourteen years, having established her base in Kansai. She has been juggling personal research with translation efforts lately. 

Osaka JALT Annual General Meeting (AGM) online

Sunday, December 10, 2023 - 9:30am to 10:30am

It's that time of year again for our Annual General Meeting (AGM) to report and reflect on the past year as a Chapter and discuss plans for the coming one, including chapter officer positions. Nominations for all officer positions are open to Osaka Chapter members up to and during the meeting. Officer terms are for one year, starting January 1st. If a position is contested, we'll hold an online election after the AGM.

To get a better sense of our team of officers, here is our current roster.

RSVP HERE to get the Zoom link, to give feedback, and/or to let us know whether you might be interested in serving as an officer or in some other way in the coming year. 

This is a good chance to learn more about Osaka JALT, share ideas, and meet several of our officers and regular members. We do hope to see you online at the meeting, but if you're not able to attend, you can still nominate yourself or another Osaka JALT member for an officer position, or give us feedback on the RSVP link. 

Address: 

Osaka

Japan

Kansai-Hokuriku 4-Corners: Exploring the Global and Local Dimensions of Narrative Inquiry in Language Teacher Identity Research

Friday, Dec 1, 7-9 pm
Join us for an enlightening workshop that delves into the profound global and local applications of narrative inquiry within the realm of language teacher identity research. Narrative inquiry is a meticulous examination of “how individuals employ stories to construct meaning from their experiences in fields of inquiry where comprehending phenomena from the perspectives of those who undergo them is of paramount significance" (Barkhuizen et al., 2014, p. 2). Language teacher identity, on the other hand, encapsulates the manner in which educators perceive themselves as instructors and how they are perceived by others in their role as educators. Throughout this workshop, Professor Barkhuizen and Professor Takaaki Hiratsuka will elucidate the intricacies of narrative inquiry and the concept of language teacher identity. They will underscore the profound advantages of equipping researchers with a deep understanding of narrative inquiry’s fundamental principles in the context of language education. Additionally, they will emphasize the importance of educators being mindful of the evolution of their identities within the specific contexts in which they operate.

Gary Barkhuizen is Professor of Applied Linguistics at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. His teaching and research interests are in the areas of language teacher education, teacher and learner identity, study abroad, and narrative inquiry. Originally from South Africa, he obtained his MA from Essex University in the UK, and his doctorate from Teachers College, Colombia University. His latest book is Language Teachers Studying Abroad: Identities, Emotions and Disruptions (2022, Multilingual Matters). 

Takaaki Hiratsuka is Professor of Applied Linguistics at Ryukoku University in Kyoto, Japan, where he supervises master’s and PhD students, both Japanese and non-Japanese, in related fields of language teacher education and narrative inquiry. His recent book publications include: Narrative Inquiry into Language Teacher Identity: ALTs in the JET program (2022, Routledge), Team Teachers in Japan: Beliefs, Identities, and Emotions (2023, Routledge), and Native-speakerism and Trans-speakerism: Entering a New Era (in press, Cambridge University Press).

This video of the two presenters discussing Professor Barkhuizen's plenary topic will give a good sense of what to expect.

This event is co-sponsored by the Kobe, Kyoto, Nara, Osaka, and Hokuriku Chapters of JALT, and will be held online as part of the 4-Corners Tour in which invited speakers at the annual international JALT conference give additional presentations throughout the country before and after the conference. Please register here to receive the Zoom link.